An employee at a body donation charity said someone dumped a trio of severed heads at his desk after he raised concerns over the way bodies were being handled at the facility.
Dale Wheatley, a deliveryman for the Anatomical Gift Association of Illinois, a group of eight in-state medical schools that "procures, prepares and preserves donations for medical and scientific study," according to its website, held a press conference during which he explained the grisly retaliation for his complaints.
The "donations" they receive are human bodies after donors die.
Mr Wheatley said that the facility was "deplorable," according to the Chicago Tribune.
"It's in shabby conditions," he said at the press conference. "If you're in there for more than five minutes, if you start walking around, you start to stick to the floor."
He said that organisations receiving the bodies from the group have sent them back, complaining of "mold and rot [and] bugs," according to WFLD.
“There’s been instances where I’ve pulled donors from our storing room out of the racks, and rats have chewed through the bottom of the bag, through the feet," he said.
The most shocking of the already morbid allegations made by Mr Wheatley is that someone left a trio of severed heads at his desk.
“My boss walked by, I asked him why the heads were at my desk,” he told the broadcaster. “He said they need to get back with their bodies so we can send them to cremation. I said, I understand that, ‘Why are they at my desk?’ and he said, ‘I don’t know Dale, there’s a lot of strange things happening.'”
He noted that the heads had an "obnoxious smell."
William O'Connor, the AGA's executive vice president, vehemently denied the allegations made by Mr Wheatley, according to the Chicago Tribune. He claimed the group receives bodies in varying states, and said that part of Mr Wheatley's job is handling body parts, noting that the delivery driver manages the rack room where bodies are stored before they are distributed.
The Independent has reached out to the AGA for comment.
Mr Wheatley, working with employment attorney David Fish, has filed several complaints with local regulators in an attempt to try to improve conditions at the AGA.
“Mr. Wheatley believes that AGA should have, and utilize, a scale to weigh donors’ bodies to determine the amount of embalming fluid required to ensure they are not subject to premature rotting and shorted usefulness,” Mr Fish told the Chicago Tribune.
Mr Wheatley claimed that the AGA was estimating the amount of embalming necessary to maintain the bodies, but said typically bodies must be weighed in order for the process to work correctly. He said the facility had no scales to weigh the bodies.
His complaints also focused on the dignity of the families whose loved ones donated bodies to that ended up at the AGA.
“There are people that are in our cooler now that need their body parts back and they have been there for three years or more,” Mr Wheatley told the broadcaster. “Right now at AGA, we have a number of cremains that need to go back to the families, over hundreds of cremains, sitting at our AGA right now.”
His attorney said Mr Wheatley does not want to take legal action, he just wants to see conditions at the facility improve. The delivery driver said the situation is taking a toll on his mental health.
“This is the only thing I can think about,” Mr Wheatley told the paper. “I can’t even sleep. Just the only thing I can think about, running it over and over in my head. I can’t believe this is happening.”
